Agatha would not so easily surrender her treasures, and the specter that confronted Drizzt when he hopped back over the broken mirror was all too real. Twinkle gleamed wickedly as Drizzt parried away Agatha’s frantic blows.

Wulfgar suspected that Drizzt needed him now, and he dismissed his savage fury, realizing that a clear head was necessary in this predicament. He scanned the room slowly, hoisting Aegis-fang for another throw. But the barbarian found that he had not yet sorted out the pattern of the illusionary spells, and the confusion of a dozen images, and the fear of hitting Drizzt, held him in check.

Effortlessly Drizzt danced around the crazed banshee and backed her up toward the treasure room. He could have struck her several times, but he had given his word to the farmers of Conyberry.

Then he had her in position. He thrust Twinkle out before him and waded in with two steps. Spitting and cursing, Agatha retreated, tripping over the broken mirror stand and falling back into the gloom. Drizzt spun toward the door.

Watching the real Agatha, and the other images, disappear from sight, Wulfgar followed the sound of her grunt and finally sorted out the layout of the dome. He readied Aegis-fang for the killing throw.

“Let it end!” Drizzt shouted at him as he passed, slapping Wulfgar on the backside with the flat of Twinkle to remind him of their mission and their promise.

Wulfgar turned to look at him, but the agile drow was already out into the dark night. Wulfgar turned back to see Agatha, her teeth bared and hands clenched, rise up on her feet.

“Pardon our intrusion,” he said politely, bowing low—low enough to follow his friend outside to safety. He sprinted along the dark path to catch up to Twinkle’s blue glow.

Then came the banshee’s third keen, chasing them down the path. Drizzt was beyond its painful range, but its sting caught up to Wulfgar and knocked him off balance. Blindly, with the smug smile suddenly wiped from his face, he stumbled forward.

Drizzt turned and tried to catch him, but the huge man bowled the drow over and continued on.

Face first into a tree.

Before Drizzt could get over to help, Wulfgar was up again and running, too scared and embarrassed, to even groan.

Behind them, Agatha wailed helplessly.

When the first of Agatha’s keens wafted on the night winds the mile or so to Conyberry, the villagers knew that Drizzt and Wulfgar had found her lair. All of them, even the children, had gathered outside of their houses and listened intently as two more wails had rolled through the night air. And now, most perplexing, came the banshee’s continual, mournful cries.

“So much fer them strangers,” chuckled one man.

“Nah, ye’re wrong,” said the old woman, recognizing the subtle shift in Agatha’s tones. “Them’s wails of losing. They beat her! They did, and got away!”

The others sat quietly, studying Agatha’s cries, and soon realized the truth of the old woman’s observations. They looked at each other incredulously.

“What’d they call themselves?” asked one man.

“Wulfgar,” offered another. “And Drizzt Do’Urden. I heared o’ them before.”

4. The City of Splendors

They were back to the main road before dawn, thundering to the west, to the coast and the city of Waterdeep. With the visit to Malchor and the business with Agatha out of the way, Drizzt and Wulfgar once again focused their thoughts on the road ahead, and they remembered the peril their halfling friend faced if they failed in the rescue. Their mounts, aided by Malchor’s enchanted horseshoes, sped along at a tremendous clip. All the landscape seemed only a blur as it rolled by.

They did not break when dawn came behind them, nor did they stop for a meal as the sun climbed overhead.

“We will have all the rest we need when we board ship and sail to the south,” Drizzt told Wulfgar.

The barbarian, determined that Regis would be saved, needed no prompting.

The dark of night came again, and the thunder of the hooves continued unbroken. Then, when the second morning found their backs, a salty breeze filled the air and the high towers of Waterdeep, the City of Splendors, appeared on the western horizon. The two riders stopped atop the high cliff that formed the fabulous settlement’s eastern border. If Wulfgar had been stunned earlier that year when he had first looked upon Luskan, five hundred miles up the coast, he now was stricken dumb. For Waterdeep, the jewel of the North, the greatest port in all the Realms, was fully ten times the size of Luskan. Even within its high wall, it sprawled out lazily and endlessly down the coast, with towers and spires reaching high into the sea mist to the edges of the companions’ vision.

“How many live here?” Wulfgar gasped at Drizzt.

“A hundred of your tribes could find shelter within the city,” the drow explained. He noted Wulfgar’s anxiety with concern of his own. Cities were beyond the experiences of the young man, and the time Wulfgar had ventured into Luskan had nearly ended in disaster. And now there was Waterdeep, with ten times the people, ten times the intrigue—and ten times the trouble.

Wulfgar settled back a bit, and Drizzt had no choice but to put his trust in the young warrior. The drow had his own dilemma, a personal battle that he now had to settle. Gingerly he took the magical mask out of his belt pouch.

Wulfgar understood the determination guiding the drow’s hesitant motions, and he looked upon his friend with sincere pity. He did not know if he could be so brave—even with Regis’s life hanging on his actions.

Drizzt turned the plain mask over in his hands, wondering at the limits of its magic. He could feel that this was no ordinary item; its power tingled to his sensitive touch. Would it simply rob him of his appearance? Or might it steal his very identity? He had heard of other, supposedly beneficial, magical items that could not be removed once worn.

“Perhaps they will accept you as you are,” Wulfgar offered hopefully.

Drizzt sighed and smiled, his decision made. “No,” he answered. “The soldiers of Waterdeep would not admit a drow elf, nor would any boat captain allow me passage to the south.” Without any more delays, he placed the mask over his face.

For a moment, nothing happened, and Drizzt began to wonder if all of his concerns had been for naught, if the mask were really a fake. “Nothing,” he chuckled uneasily after a few more seconds, tentative relief in his tone. “It does not—” Drizzt stopped in midsentence when he noticed Wulfgar’s stunned expression.

Wulfgar fumbled in his pack and produced a shiny metal cup. “Look,” he bade Drizzt and handed him the makeshift mirror.

Drizzt took the cup in trembling hands—hands that trembled more when Drizzt realized they were no longer black—and raised it to his face. The reflection was poor—even poorer in the morning light to the drow’s night eyes—but Drizzt could not mistake the image before him. His features had not changed, but his black skin now held the golden hue of a surface elf. And his flowing hair, once stark white, showed lustrous yellow, as shiny as if it had caught the rays of the sun and held them fast.

Only Drizzt’s eyes remained as they had been, deep pools of brilliant lavender. No magic could dim their gleam, and Drizzt felt some small measure of relief, at least, that his inner person had apparently remained untainted.

Yet he did not know how to react to this blatant alteration. Embarrassed, he looked to Wulfgar for approval.

Wulfgar’s visage had turned sour. “By all the measures known to me, you appear as any other handsome elven warrior,” he answered to Drizzt’s inquiring gaze. “And surely a maiden or two will blush and turn her eyes when you stride by.”